Page 55 of Right Number

“Uh, hi, Bree. Sarah. Nice to see you,” Liam said awkwardly. Bree and Sarah looked back and forth between Liam and me. It only took a fleeting moment before they both realized they’d walked right into the middle of something. Liam cleared his throat and nervously ran one of his hands through his curly hair. “I…I uh…I should really get going. There are a few people I need to talk to that I haven’t yet.”

“Yeah,” I jumped in. “That sounds good. Thank you, Liam. The painting is beautiful.” Liam gave me a quick nod, seeming grateful for the assistance in helping him make an exit. The situation had moved so far past awkward, I wasn’t sure where I’d ended up.

As Liam walked away into the crowd, Bree and Sarah turned to look at the painting. Their eyes turned big and their mouths dropped open as they stared at the brilliant and beautiful work of art.

“Is that...” Sarah started to say.

“Holy shit! It’s you!” Bree interrupted.

They turned and looked at me. I drew in a big, shaky breath as I looked at them with a rising sense of panic. “I think I’ve made a terrible mistake.” I reached my hand up to my throat. My whole face was hot and my stupid pink dress suddenly felt three sizes too small.

Bree and Sarah silently looked at the painting, then at me, then back to the painting. Sarah was the first to speak. “Anna, you’re in an emotionally charged state right now. This is not the time to be making, or acting on, any big decisions.” Her face was twisted in worry and she had both her hands up like she was trying to approach a scared animal.

I stared at Sarah and Bree for a moment as my mouth tried to catch up to the millions of thoughts whirling through my head at lightning speed. “What if I made a mistake ending things with Liam and trying to start something with Mason?” I choked out as my hand went from my throat to my stomach. I felt like I was going to be sick.

Bree and Sarah glanced at each other. It was Bree’s turn to speak up. “Sweetie, you made that decision based on what your heart wanted before you knew about the painting.”

“But Liam is here, painting beautiful works of art for me. Mason can’t even leave work when he’s supposed to and catch a damn flight for me!” I could hear my voice get increasingly frantic and high pitched as I tried to fight off the overwhelming sense of panic sweeping through me. I didn’t want to freak out in the middle of the Spring Art Show in my stupid pink party dress. I tugged at the bodice, trying to create some space to breathe. God, I hated that fucking dress.

“The whole situation got really messed up tonight.” My head snapped over to Sarah as she spoke. “But I still don’t think you should make any type of decision about anything right now.”

“Have you talked to Mason?” Bree asked.

I shook my head. “No. I turned my phone off when I got here.” I’d completely forgotten about the fact it was stashed safely away in my glittery wristlet.

“You need to at least talk to him before you make any decisions,” Bree advised as Sarah nodded in agreement.

I sighed and squeezed my eyes closed. I knew they were right. I needed to talk to Mason even though it felt like there was nothing he could say to fix the night. The fact remained he wasn’t there on what should’ve been one of the biggest, most important, and exciting nights for a student in the art department. “I’ll call him,” I finally said as I opened my eyes.

Sarah came over and linked her arm with mine. “Let’s go see your photography display.”

I hesitated. “I’m not sure I want to do that right now. It’s all the pictures I took with Liam and I’m barely holding my shit together as is.”

Bree stepped forward and linked her arm through my other. “Maybe we can walk around for a little while and then go see it. You’ve worked so hard to get here; I don’t want you to miss out on seeing your art in the show.”

I gave a half-hearted smile to them both. “Yeah, that sounds good.”

We walked arm in arm around the rest of the paintings on display. The three of us were admiring an abstract piece with bold colors when suddenly there was a voice from behind us. “Champagne?”

I turned to see the waiter from earlier in the evening standing there with a big smile and a tray full of champagne flutes. “Perfect timing!” I said, smiling back at him.

“I see you can add ‘model’ to your growing list of talents,” the waiter said as Bree, Sarah, and I all reached for glasses.

I couldn’t help but let out a small chuckle. “Yeah. I guess something like that,” I muttered.

“Do you two know each other?” Sarah asked, her confusion evident as she took a sip of champagne.

“We just met tonight,” I informed her.

“Thank you for the champagne.” Bree tipped her glass to the waiter. “Let’s go check out the other exhibit,” she said as she raised her eyebrow and jerked her head to the side.

“Sure,” I said, unsure why she was acting so strange. “Thank you,” I told the waiter.

“Anytime. I’m here all night,” he said, looking directly at me.

Bree grabbed my arm as we walked towards the stairs. “What are you doing?” I asked when we were away from the waiter.

“Good lord, Anna. We don’t need to add an overly flirty waiter to the messy pileup of stuff tonight.” Bree rolled her eyes.

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